Posted on 01/31/2005 7:32:44 PM PST by churchillbuff
At Los Angeles International Airport two weeks ago, FBI agents arrested an Irish businessman they had spent a week tailing all over California's Silicon Valley, from the offices of two electronics manufacturers in Sunnyvale to a hotel in Mountain View and down a quiet cul-de-sac to a suburban house in San Jose. The technology exporter, according to court papers, had purchased sophisticated computer components in the U.S. to send to Russia through Ireland. He now stands to be charged in mid-February with "unlawful export of 'defense articles.'" U.S. officials point to this little-noticed case as one manifestation of a troubling reality: although the cold war is long over, Russia is fielding an army of spooks in the U.S. that is at least equal in number to the one deployed by the old, much larger Soviet Union.
Russia runs more than 100 known spies under official cover in the U.S., senior U.S. intelligence and law-enforcement officials say. And those are just the more easily spotted spies working under the classic guise of diplomat. An unknown number of so-called nocs—who work under nonofficial cover as businessmen and -women, journalists or academics—undoubtedly expand the Russian spy force. "They're baaaaack," says a former senior U.S. intelligence official who worked against Moscow during the cold war. "They're busy as hell, but I don't think we've really got what it is that they're doing." The number of Russian spies in the U.S. is especially surprising, given that it was less than four years ago that the Bush Administration expelled 50 of them in retaliation for the humiliating discovery that FBI counterintelligence agent Robert Hanssen had been spying for Russia for 21 years.
In a high-level meeting late last year, officials tell TIME, the National Security Council instructed the FBI, CIA, State Department and other agencies to get a better handle on the Russian espionage threat. While the U.S. might like to eject suspect diplomats to force the Russians to send in their "rookies," as a U.S. official put it, Moscow would probably respond in kind, denting the CIA's corps in Russia.
As the FBI has remade itself in the wake of 9/11 into a counterterrorism agency, the bureau's long-standing counterintelligence mission has been bumped down a notch on the priority list. During this time, Russia has been among the U.S.'s rivals most aggressively exploiting the opening to build up its spying capabilities. Also, it has been using liberalized immigration rules for Russians, instituted after the cold war, to install nocs.
Officials say the Russians are after secrets about American military technology and hardware, dual-use technology such as the latest lasers, and the Administration's plans and intentions regarding the former Soviet states, China, the Middle East and U.S. energy policy, among other matters. Russia also wants to learn as much as possible about its biggest strategic worry: the U.S.'s ramped-up commitment to missile defense, which could eventually threaten Moscow's nuclear deterrent. Asked about the Russian spy surge, Russian embassy spokesman Yevgeniy Khorishko replied, "We do not comment on any of the issues concerning intelligence."
In addition to embassy-based spies, Russia—along with China, Pakistan, Iran and any number of other countries, including U.S. allies—relies on many hard-to-trace front companies, often run through third-party countries, to acquire secrets and dual-use technology. "We think there are thousands of these companies," a senior U.S. official said.
David Szady, the FBI's assistant director for counterintelligence, who is in charge of keeping tabs on foreign spies on U.S. soil, told TIME that in the next five years he wants to double the number of agents chasing spooks. Already, the FBI has placed counterespionage squads of at least seven agents in all 56 of its field division offices over the past year. What about the chance that damaging U.S. moles are helping Russia today? Says one U.S. senior intelligence official: "There's always evidence of another mole because there are always unexplained events. There are always unexplained losses. There are always enough dots that look strange."
Sharon has more spies in America than does Putin. Spying is normal - for allies and foes alike - we do it too.
Who has more spies in America - Israel or Russia? Or Britain?
Fact: Alcoholism is effectively epidemic in Russia.
Fact: Sixty-five percent of all Russian males are drunk at the time of their deaths.
And I stand by everything else I said. [Drug-resistant TB, AIDS etceteras]
Really, and where are these facts from? Site the location and source: FACT: 5% of Americans die as a result of Alien Abduction complications.
You been served!!!
"Let's just say I comprehend the Russian language a whole lot better than I ever let them be aware of! No they're not all spies of course. but there are some...never mind - you honestly do not want to know what I know."
And gee, they wouldn't even think to look on a website like this and see your comment. Now you've done it, they'll be after you! Come on, reality time, if they are trained spies/sleeper agents/etc., they would not say anything in Russian, French, English, German, Italian, etc., within earshot of you. If you are "hearing things" they're probably screwing with you. Being married to a Russian woman you should understand their sense of humor.
"And the incredibly high rate of illnesses Russians bring with them, including AIDS, pretty-well-incurable, drug-resistant, TB and hepatitis -- and the endemic alcoholism from which 60+% of Russian men die -- should be scaring the pants off someone or other among the Peter-Principled-persons who populate and pick up checks from the feral gummint's vast health, communicable-diseases and security bureaucracies."
Wrong - people with those afflictions are not allowed to come to the US. Check out www.usembassy.ru and see the medical screening (using only Embassy approved and certified doctors) they have to go through.
Fact: Alcoholism is effectively epidemic in Russia.
FACT: Alcoholism is on the decline in Russia. The new generation considers alcholics "uncool."
Fact: Sixty-five percent of all Russian males are drunk at the time of their deaths.
FACT: You're Wrong
And I stand by everything else I said. [Drug-resistant TB, AIDS etceteras: Yes, it's a problem. But Russian tourists and immigrants do not bring it into our country.
<< Wrong - people with those afflictions are not allowed to come to the US. >>
Rubbish.
You are talking about legal emigrants/immigrants.
Most of the third world's riff-raff [And such terrorists who chose to] come as "tourists" and/or as illegal migrants -- three million in 2004 alone -- and Russians are no exception.
I have an obviously better understanding of my own situations than you would, so a discussion with you is useless. I am well aware of the Russian sense of humor
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